Programming Note: Due to the large number of cards to preview, we are starting the previews before the pre-orders are available. Pre-orders will be up soon. Plus, Preview Monday will be twice as nice as usual, with TWO Summoner Wars previews per day. TWO!

Welcome, everyone, to the first look at the 40th deck in Summoner Wars! FORTY!!!

Before we get into the actual preview, I want to make a couple of things clear about this specific deck, the Second Mercenary Summoner, Farrah Oathbreaker.

Farrah Oathbreaker is my attempt at a “thank you” to all Summoner Wars players, but especially to those who have hung around for quite a while and have really gotten into this game. Summoner Wars has been a big part of my life over the past 5 years - I’ve invested a lot of time into it, had a ton of fun, co-starred in a podcast, got to try my hand a little in game design, and most of all met some really cool people both online and in real life just because of this game. It is what it is because of the players and fans, and I wanted to give something back.

So, this deck might not seem very easy for a new player to pick up and play, and part of that is because I wanted to give longtime players cool mechanics and answers to fans pleas for “help” in some areas, and doing that required a couple rules cards and effects that can get a bit wordy, even if what they do is relatively simple once its done.

However, it wouldn’t be a Plaid Hat product without deep theme and story. I wanted to make sure that Farrah was deeply engrained into the Summoner Wars lore and as thematic as possible, and I hope I’ve accomplished that. That’s partly why I wanted to share Kynstri’s Mission with everyone before the previews. So please keep those things in mind as you read through Farrah’s cards, which I’m very excited about! And to all the Summoner Wars players out there, thank you!

OK, public service announcement out of the way. Let’s see Farrah!

Even though we’ve seen in her story that Farrah is very cunning and manipulative, she does know that working together makes everyone stronger. Farrah is an excellent and very persuasive leader, and she knows how to maximize the versatility of her troops. This is seen in her UNITY ability - she is able to capitalize on how her vast variety of units work together, oftentimes distracting the enemy while she finds the weak spot in their armor.

But wait a second… this is a Mercenary deck, right? Mercenary Unit have no Faction Symbol… so how is Farrah going to take advantage of her ability? Well, what we see in Farrah’s deck is a Mercenary company composed of spies in the real Itharian factions. I’ve already spoiled that one way Farrah can get Faction Symbols onto the board is by deckbuilding Common Units from the other Factions into her deck (up to 6 of them - kind of the anti-Mercenary rule!), though she is limited to only 3 copies at maximum of any specific Common Unit. But what about her base deck? What if I’m not into deckbuilding? Well, for that, we have Common Mercenary Units in her deck that also have Faction Symbols!

This is how Farrah takes advantage of everything “Faction Symbol”-related in her base deck – she has 6 different Mercenary Common Units, each with a different Faction Symbol! Trust me when I tell you that’s all you need to make this deck go. In terms of deckbuilding , this is a bit of a double-edged sword. First and foremost, these Mercenary Commons won’t be able to be built into just any deck like the Mercenaries of old (though the Champions can be). That’s a bit of a downer, I’ll admit. But, the plus side is that where they can go, they will gain the benefits of Faction specific cards! There have been so many times I’ve included a Mercenary in another Faction’s deck and been holding an Event card that I really wanted to use on them, but it doesn’t work. These guys work!

But now, onto probably the most thematic card that Farrah has, and really her calling card. Take a deep breath:

I know that was a lot to digest. Let me summarize for you:

Get down a Unit with the same Faction Symbol as the opposing Summoner

Place Undercover Agent under that Unit

Until you discard Undercover Agent, your opponent plays open-handed and you have an invincible guy walking around that can’t attack.

This card introduces really 3 new and cool mechanics into Summoner Wars all by itself.

First is open-handed play. There are a select few cards that will allow you to glimpse an opponent’s hand, but never just permanently make them play open-handed like this does. When her agent is in place, Farrah always knows what the opponent is saving up to do, or holding deep in store for a future turn, which can be a huge advantage.

Second is cards that you can put on a guy and take off whenever you want. Obviously you might want to eventually reveal yourself as a double-agent and smack your old Summoner in the face, right?

And third is the concept of an invincible Unit. An Undercover Agent can’t be attacked or otherwise affected by an enemy card, so its really the ultimate blocker! It pays to have a man on the inside!

Now, though, I’m sure you’re wondering, “Well, that’s great that maybe I have 6 different Faction Symbols in the deck, but there’s 23 different Faction Symbols in Summoner Wars! How do I make sure I have the matching symbol?” Well, Farrah has a plethora of different ways just in the base deck alone to do this, and I’ll show you two of them today. First off, the easiest (and probably most effective) way:

If you’ve read Kynstri’s Mission, you’ve met Mingle before. She’s the chameleon-like Vekkid shape-shifter that was impersonating Vlox, and is Farrah’s top spy. Her abilities allow her to blend in with any Faction anywhere by taking on their appearance, and she’s a master at deception. Mingle is always ready to jump right onto the Battlefield to go undercover, and once you see more of Farrah’s cards, you’ll realize she’s probably her most essential Champion. Besides all that, she can be deckbuilt into any Faction and benefit from their Faction-specific cards by using BLEND IN on a friendly Unit!

What, Mingle isn’t enough to get that matching Faction Symbol? Well then, how about this guy instead?

The Changelings that Farrah has recruited from the Phoenix Elves to spy on poor Prince Elien and his infernal mother also are great for spying on other Factions! Unlike Mingle, who just blends in by disguising herself, these guys can actually morph into other Units and gain their powers! Battling with the Benders? Change into a Controller and control them! Dancing with the Deep Dwarves? Change into a Gem Mage and blast away! Changelings really like those 2 attack, 1 Life ranged Units since they get a bit of a discount with them (or how about Fire Archers? Queen Maldaria might like to get them out a bit cheaper!), but their real power might just be changing into an opponent’s Unit that’s in your Discard Pile to go undercover and wreak havoc! It’s almost like having the Filth’s ability to mutate at will, or Ret-Talus' ability to use RAISE THE DEAD on your opponent’s Units!

So, once you’ve infiltrated enemy lines with a man (or an evil she-Vekkid) on the inside, are you content to just learn about their hand? How do you strike???

I’m so happy I got to design a Tundra Orc Common Unit, because they’re the easiest Units ever to name – you just say what the Unit does, and add “-er”! These guys are spying on Grognack and Torgan for Farrah, and they’re very lethal shock troops.

Summoning during the Event Phase will already allow you to drop a fresh Wall and immediately summon an Invader where your opponent isn’t expecting one. If you have a matching Faction Symbol with your opponent though, you can summon next to that Unit as well. So now not only is your Undercover Agent invincible, but it's an invincible moving Wall! Enemy Summoners have a heck of a time staying away from Undercover Agents in fear of Invaders jumping out to surprise them! As for deckbuilding with them, I’ll let you guys discuss the kinds of tricks Torgan can pull with a bunch of these guys in his deck…

And the fun doesn’t stop there! Well, for today it does, but next time I’ll go into even more ways Farrah can manipulate the Faction Symbols in her deck and use her undercover spies to tear apart Factions from the inside. Next week, though, we'll get back into Saturos and Natazga and more of the nastiness they have in store!

Sure you can, but only if you have a Mutation in your Discard Pile. I didn't show the deckbuilding rules card because I already told everyone that she only has a max 3x Common Limit, but can use 6 commons from other decks, but on there it actually specifically disallows her from building Mutations into her deck.

Did anyone catch that we actually spoiled the name / faction of another Common not in this preview?

As for the other two, my guess would be Vanguards and cloaks, based on the lore of Farrah herself, and the fact that it seems unlikely that the upcoming second summoner factions will get plenty of goodies and these two may need the most help (JE and/or FK seem fine at the moment).

Very clever KC. You found a way to make a mini reinforcement pack for a bunch of factions! Form the looks of the invader you are also trying to give us units needed to make some weaker summoners stronger. On top of that Farrah also looks really fun to play.

Also, I need to give a shout-out to Cory Bullock (or darkbladecb as he was here on the boards). He was the Lead Playtester before I was, and years ago when we were talking one day about future decks, he told me that he had an idea for a 2nd Merc Summoner that got stronger as there were more different Units on the Battlefield. Never forgot that, and that's really where Farrah was born.

@Iliad - not if you deckbuild, because Farrah can deckbuild in anyone's stuff. In base decks, that issue is there, but with Mingle, Changelings and other ways to get a matching symbol, its not a huge deal.

@killercactus Does this text fragment: "I have learned that they employ guards within the midst of their ranks that shield the others. They are imbued with magic to protect their comrades." spoil a new Vargath unit or does it refer to something different?

strobeflier, I'd say all four art pieces revealed are great! Farrah's really speaks to a battle worn warrior and the Invader looks suitably sinister. I'm excited she has the most units if the art keeps being this top notch amongst the rest.

At first I was a bit overwhelmed by the sheer amount of text on Undercover Agent but now I think Farrah might be one of the coolest and most fun to play summoners :)
Just hoping they open preorders for Polish edition without much delay or - better - at the same time as American.

Awesome and super tricky to give tools to other weaker decks. I need to play the deck before I really understand how it will turn out in a battle, very interesting.
One note here - is the changeling really balanced? I mean it's basically a 1r/1 unit for 0! That's so far the best 0 coster in the game, stat wise (maybe bomber are better but these guys have no disadvantage) and 2 magic 1 life units will be even CHEAPER (not slightly more expensive) if you summon them with the discard ability! That seems awefully strong, especially vs. Deep(Dwarves)Benders (Gemmage, MW, Controlers for 1 magic cost), JE Lioneers (for 2 magic) and JS Shaman, all Mutations with a -1 discount?, FireArchers, Sniper. And every other how attack unit has the same summon cost as the normal card.

You're only getting a discount if Life &lt; Summon Cost, and they give 2 magic to the opponent upon death unless you self-kill them (which is pretty beneficial but tough on Farrah because she needs the board control) or have Farrah's other unrevealed trick.

And sure they're a 1r/1 for 0, but they have no ability if you use them for that. Basically their ability is that they have range. We tested it and it was fine.

Undercover seems extremely powerful. Not sure how to feel about a potentially permanent effect that the opponent has no options to deal with. I trust in SW playtesting always, but it certainly sounds scary.

The other thing is that if you just deal with everything else, they don't really have a choice but to break cover and come at you. They can't attack or use their abilities when Undercover, so sometimes you can just ignore it as long as you watch out for a big play at your Summoner or something.

Damn, so psyched for this deck, not to mention the deckbuilding possibilities. May have to make an exception to the deckbuilding rule of only using 1 copy of each set--3 Invaders doesn't seem like enough for Torgan! Seems like they can effectively replace Crushers' firepower and Shooters' reach all in one sweet card.

Also, I'm sure Farrah's base deck will be good but there's no denying she'll be much better when she can build in units of the faction she's facing. Makes me think she'll have a good time in tournaments where her decklist isn't sealed in beforehand.

Coolest art. Groovy mechanic. Excited at the power-up that Torgan gets. I'm trying to hold back my enthusiasm, but I think there's a good chance that Farrah becomes my all-time favorite summoner. In regards to Farrah's art specifically, it's a lot cooler than it looked in the preview to the previews.

Does undecover can work with Mingle? It looks like there is some kind of contradiction. Since it says that the unit loses it's ability and only has undercover agent, Mingle loses his faction symbol and therefore do not respect anymore the condition of the card?

In the other case scenario, it looks way too powerful to have a guy like Mingle with undercover agent that can go straight for the opponent summoner. With 3 dices, I can easily see a couple summoner that would not be able to come back from such a vicious attack.

Is it just me or Farrah Oathbreaker is way more powerful than any other summoner?

I think that undercover agent should only work on common. But, hey, you know what? I haven't test it, so as always, I thrust you guys!

At the time Undercover Agent is played, Mingle still has a Faction Symbol, so you can choose her. She loses the Symbol once she has the UNDERCOVER ability though, so that's relevant for Farrah's AV.

And yes, Mingle can charge straight at an oppoennt's Summoner... and then can't attack it due to the UNDERCOVER ability, unless she discards it. I would suggest moving the Summoner away or otherwise blocking with a Unit which, again, she can't kill unless she loses UNDERCOVER.

The strange thing is that if Farrah had some weird way of building a vine wall herself, like with a swamp beast, it WOULD mess with her undercover agent's movement, but an opponent's vine wall wouldn't.

I guess the agent would be 'pretending' to struggle with Farrah's vine wall to keep up the facade?

My guess for the Lurker is that it has a wall-related ability. This is based on its name, the inclusion in the Mercenaries faction, Rallul's Mercenaries having wall-related abilities, and that we haven't yet seen any wall-related abilities in Farrah's deck (though Mingle=moving, summoning wall for Invaders, but that's a pretty creative stretch of the idea of "wall-related abilities").

A point that hasn't been made: Changelings help offset the inevitable "splashiness" of Farrah's deck, providing, at the same time, more flexibility and stability.

Changelings will definitely be welcome in Immortal Elien, now that I think about it. He already likes a few firelings as sacrifice fodder, and the better statline of changelings will be handy in a pinch. Their ability isn't gamechanging outside Farrah--it's only above the economic curve for 2r/1 for 2 units, which is offset by the fact that it becomes a pinata unit with 1 life.

On the topic of Farrah vs Rallul, imo it'd be a nicer solution if all the units in Rallul's deck were errata'd to have their own special symbol. That way they can no longer be built outside of Rallul/Farrah/Glurblub (which is a suggestion I've heard from a lot of players), and Farrah would just need an app mage to use undercover agent against him.

Glurblub can use these units, right? So spore carriers + invaders is a thing we can look forward to?

I was thinking about this again, and I just realized the most powerful unit to Changeling into that nobody seems to have mentioned: PE Warrior. Normally, a PE warrior gets summoned for 2 magic (including the card), deals 1.33 damage, and gets killed by Elien next turn to get a magic back. Slightly better magic economy than Burn, slightly less convenient to use. Who cares.

But with Changelings, you're getting 2 magic back. Which means a Changeling->PE Warrior play gives you 1.33 damage... costing no magic. Admittedly, your opponent has a chance to get the 2 magic for themself in between the Warrior blaze-stepping and getting killed by Elien, but all it takes is putting a wall somewhere so the Warrior can Blaze Step to the back row for this to become quite difficult. And Elien can do it 6 times a game. What was the playtesting thought on that combo?

I really wish there was a way to counteract the under cover agent effect. Pulling this out early seems like a huge advantage and if there is nothing the other player can do to counteract it, I imagine it will become frustrating and un-fun. Where is the balance in "I get to see your hand the rest of the game, and there is nothing you can do about it"